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03 January 2008 / Peter Vaines
Issue: 7302 / Categories: Opinion , Public , Commercial
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New year resolutions

Peter Vaines suggests that the government turns over a new leaf

 

Now is a good time to look back over 2007 with a glow of satisfaction— or perhaps to draw a veil over the events of the year and to resolve that 2008 will be better. I imagine Gordon Brown (and Alistair Darling) will have mixed feelings. As Brown looks back he will remember the joy of finally reaching the summit of his ambition. He will not want to forget those heady days immediately following his succession to that other chap—whose name seems already to have been forgotten—when he could do no wrong. If we had given him a cricket bat, or a pair of rugby boots, he would have won the World Cups all on his own. Unfortunately, his period of satisfaction lasted no longer than the traditional cigarette and he now must be looking forward to 2008 in the hope that nobody remembers much about 2007—nor his contribution to previous years either. Somehow, I don’t think so.
Darling found himself catapulted
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NEWS
Children can claim for ‘lost years’ damages in personal injury cases, the Supreme Court has held in a landmark judgment
The cab-rank rule remains a bulwark of the rule of law, yet lawyers are increasingly judged by their clients’ causes. Writing in NLJ this week, Ian McDougall, president of the LexisNexis Rule of Law Foundation, warns that conflating representation with endorsement is a ‘clear and present danger’
Holiday lets may promise easy returns, but restrictive covenants can swiftly scupper plans. Writing in NLJ this week, Andrew Francis of Serle Court recounts how covenants limiting use to a ‘private dwelling house’ or ‘private residence’ have repeatedly defeated short-term letting schemes
Artificial intelligence (AI) is already embedded in the civil courts, but regulation lags behind practice. Writing in NLJ this week, Ben Roe of Baker McKenzie charts a landscape where AI assists with transcription, case management and document handling, yet raises acute concerns over evidence, advocacy and even judgment-writing
The Supreme Court has drawn a firm line under branding creativity in regulated markets. In Dairy UK Ltd v Oatly AB, it ruled that Oatly’s ‘post-milk generation’ trade mark unlawfully deployed a protected dairy designation. In NLJ this week, Asima Rana of DWF explains that the court prioritised ‘regulatory clarity over creative branding choices’, holding that ‘designation’ extends beyond product names to marketing slogans
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